To Sail The Ocean Blue
by elincia
Summary: Of shells and ships and broken promises. RikuSora


A/N: Erm... yes. Well, I wrote this at, like, 3:00 am, and... stuff. I, uh... yeah. If you're opposed to shounen-ai, leave now, even though the shounen-ai is very, very mild, and if you blink you'll miss it.  
  
----  
  
The ocean lapped eagerly at Sora's feet; swirling, pulling, as though it wished to draw him in sooner than planned.  
  
In his hand was Kairi's thalassa shell necklace, its smooth curves cool against his skin.  
  
"Sailors wear them for good luck," she had said, hanging her creation from Sora's neck as though he were a king.  
  
He clasped the necklace around his neck again, toying idly with the small, white shells as his thoughts drifted towards the raft.  
  
'To sail the ocean blue,' he thought absentmindedly, remembering the line from somewhere... a song, or a poem, or a story. Something from so long ago he could barely remember anyways.  
  
But... only sometimes was the ocean blue. Oftentimes it was green... beautiful and somehow so full of life despite the fact that it was dead.  
  
Of course, something that had never lived in the first place couldn't really be dead, could it?  
  
Maybe the ocean had never been blue at all.  
  
He stared out across its wide, gleaming surface, like the mouth of a hungry crocodile, his eyes stopping just where it and the sky met, contrasting like glass and velvet and yet blending together like watercolour paints in blues and greens.  
  
The ocean seemed so tranquil, yet terrifyingly powerful, almost unstoppable... all at once.  
  
Tangled forever in a sensual dance with the sweet sky, with swirling soft pearl clouds and shimmering, inescapable whirlpools.  
  
Always touching, yet worlds apart.  
  
'For good luck,' Sora repeated in his head.  
  
----  
  
Riku found him there, hours later, with the necklace in his hand again and a sandcastle at his side, slowly being eaten away by the hungry crocodile ocean, pulling in everything and swallowing it up.  
  
"Hey, lazy... what are you doing?" Riku asked as he sat himself in the sand, next to Sora.  
  
"Oh... nothing." He dropped the necklace in the sand, next to the sandcastle, and turned to face him. Riku's moon-pale skin seemed to glow in the reflection of the glass ocean. "What do you think it'll be like out there... on the ocean?"  
  
Riku did not look at him, but at the sky, silently marveling at its vastness, when he replied, "Just like the stories our parents used to tell us. You know... the ones about pirates."  
  
Sora laughed a little and wiggled his toes in the sticky, wet sand. "You think so?"  
  
"Maybe."  
  
----  
  
Hours later, again, the sandcastle had been swallowed completely by the ocean, swallowed and forgotten. The sun had begun to set, the ocean appearing to swallow it up also.  
  
It seemed to swallow everything up, sometimes.  
  
The sky exploded in a dance of reds and oranges, and the clouds, no longer pearly, but fiery, drifted across the sky like dragon gods.  
  
Sora had once again placed the thalassa shells around his neck.  
  
"... Riku?" He spoke up for the first time in longer than either could remember.  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Can you... promise me something?"  
  
"I don't know."  
  
Sora sighed, his gaze again returning to the ocean, sparkling with diamonds of pink and orange and red.  
  
Not blue.  
  
Sometimes blue.  
  
Maybe never blue.  
  
"Once we set sail... just... don't leave me, okay?"  
  
Riku laughed softly, the sound like waves or chimes or wind, and said, "Okay, Sora."  
  
"No, I really mean it!" Sora dug his toes deeper into the sand, tracing patterns, watching as the ocean slowly erased his path. "I just don't want to be separated from you."  
  
"And why is that?"  
  
Sora looked him in the eyes, surprised to notice how Riku's eyes were deep, and shimmering, and green... like the ocean.  
  
"Cause I'd miss you if you were gone."  
  
Riku stared back, unsurprised to notice that Sora's eyes were sweet and swirling and blue... like the sky.  
  
"I know." 


End file.
